At this juncture, Star Trek Online‘s story content has split off into two different types. Regular story-based content, and story content based on the game’s reputation system. STO‘s newly appointed Exectutive Producer Stephen D’Angelo confirmed that the developer will be focusing more on the latter when developing story content in the future.

“There is always a tension between building straightforward story content and building content that is designed for repeated play. Story content takes more dev time to develop. It is very popular, but it is consumed very quickly and has less “replayability,'” Mr. D’Angelo told Massively, “Content designed for repeat play is generally lighter on story, but we work hard to fit these pieces of content into support roles or backstory for the main storyline. We are striving for a balance here that keeps the story moving forward, while providing players replayable content. Reputations are a way to reward players for playing the content, so we do plan to continue having them for most content.”

Star Trek Online‘s Season 8.5 is scheduled to be released this Thursday, January 30th, 2014.